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Conjugal frights

Elizabeth Buchan is a post-romantic novelist, concerned with the life that follows the instruction, “You may now kiss the bride.” Her new novel starts with the registry- office wedding of Minty to Nathan, the bride pregnant, the husband marrying for the second time, “anxious not to make a big deal of the day”.

Nathan’s desire to keep the day low key is understandable; he is tying the knot with the woman who enticed him away from his blameless first wife, Rose, having first stolen Rose’s job. And since the distressed Rose has slunk out of the marital home, Minty has inherited her house as well as her husband.

Minty gives birth to twins, finds a part-time position in a television company, and might be considered to have it all, a feat accomplished because she is a spectacularly nasty piece of